


Where the Sun Gutters from the Sky

by happymango



Category: Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys - My Chemical Romance (Album), The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Comic)
Genre: Better Living Industries, Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff, M/M, Nonbinary Party Poison (Danger Days), One Shot, Pining, Pre-Fabulous Killjoys Comic, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:27:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,834
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24836113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/happymango/pseuds/happymango
Summary: There were a handful of years before they became legends; before the Girl, before a revolution was entrusted to them for safekeeping, before their firefights sharpened into missions. A handful of years where Fun Ghoul found the time to fall in love.Title taken from Anne Sexton's The Truth the Dead Know.
Relationships: Fun Ghoul/Party Poison (Danger Days)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 55





	Where the Sun Gutters from the Sky

_i. refusing the stiff procession to the grave_

Ghoul hasn’t had time for beautiful things in his life. The simple truth is that there haven’t been many beautiful things in his life. He tore out of Battery City as a scrawny thirteen-year-old, angry enough to risk the desert despite not knowing shit about it. He fell in with a crew, discovered a talent for bombs, and before he even had the time to realize he was happy, he lost them all in a drac raid, days short of his sixteenth birthday.

It took a long time for him to feel anything after that.

But now, he has evenings of simple contentment looking up at a canopy of stars. He has the luxury of taking a bike out just to see what’s around. He sees the shaggy bulk of Joshua trees against a wide-open sky, the splotches of hardy cacti tucked between wind-worn boulders, even the occasional pale flash of a scorpion. He’s starting to notice the world, instead of just living in it.

And Poison, they’re very hard not to notice.

They’re blinding sometimes. Always in action, always a haze of neon and light. Even muted with the desert dust that covers everything, they’re resplendent, the filth of this war never really touching them. But it’s apparently not enough to look like some angel of revolution—Poison somehow manages to be on a whole other level at home. They’ll don baggy shirts and spend hours spray painting a masterpiece on scrap metal, emerging with blackened hands and a genuine smile. They’ll pull together a shitty campfire and drag everyone outside to look at constellations that they've all forgotten the names of.

He's not sure when it changes from noticing Poison to looking at them, but it’s seven months into his time with the crew that Kobra calls him on it.

“You better not try shit,” the blonde plants himself in front of him one night after dinner, and he blinks in surprise over his water.

“I’m not?” It comes out as a question, which is not what he’d intended, but he has no idea what Kobra is even talking about.

“You keep looking at Poison. Don’t try anything. We’re a crew now, and I like you, but if you even think about picking a fight you’ll answer to me.”

He grunts, a prickle of annoyance in the back of his mind at being so obvious. But it’s better to let Kobra believe that he’s still hung up on his brawling days rather than…whatever this is. He studiously doesn’t poke at the amorphous feeling in his chest, and resolves to look at Poison less.

That resolution lasts about as long as it takes for Poison to start talking, meaning no time at all. And Ghoul can’t help but glance over to where the redhead is picking up steam as they describe the prank war going on at Gravel Gertie’s orphanage. Their voice squeaks as they fight to get the words out through snorts of laughter that light up their whole face and—fuck, Ghoul’s outright staring again. Nervously, he turns back to Kobra, who’s gone from hostile to…amused? It’s a matter of a few vital degrees in the angle of his eyebrows, but Ghoul is sure he’s reading this right.

“So it’s that then.”

He doesn’t elaborate, only giving Poison a commiserating pat on the shoulder as he leaves.

* * *

_ii. and when we touch we enter touch entirely_

It’s irritating. Ghoul wants to say something. Poison touches people so freely—they’ll crawl into Jet’s lap and drop off to sleep whether it’s convenient for the guy or not, they’ll hug the jackknife that is Kobra Kid close at every opportunity, they’ll greet Show Pony and News A-Go-Go with melodramatic kisses to both cheeks—but they don’t touch him.

Alright, maybe he’s kind of responsible for that. Their first few weeks together had basically consisted of him immersed in his bombs and snarling at the other three when they tried to make any smalltalk. He’d just lost his first crew and the only thing he wanted to do was make BLI pay for it, so he’d joined up with the most trigger-happy ‘joys desert gossip could find him. A simple “I’ll be your detonator” later and he’d moved his things into the Diner, but he hadn’t really planned to live beyond the next firefight.

Except it turned out that they made a pretty good team, and their next clap wasn’t so much a suicide mission as a victory lap, so Ghoul stayed on. It was nice to feel useful again. And bit by bit, he realized he actually liked the others. When Jet came back one day from a supply run flushed with adrenaline and clutching a busted-up guitar missing its strings, he’d jumped to help him fix it and they’d spent the evening passing it back and forth like a sacrament, playing what they could remember from pasts neither of them wanted to talk about. It didn’t take long for the other two to come investigate the source of the noise, and Poison had been uncharacteristically silent, leaning against their brother as they both listened. That was when Ghoul had realized _huh, this is my crew_.

It got easier, after that. He started tagging along with Jet on supply runs and watching Kobra practice his bike flips and helping Poison make something edible out of the day’s rations. Somewhere along the line he stopped thinking of himself as just another weapon and started being a person again.

But Poison still doesn’t touch him. They smile, wide and fond, and call him _Ghoulie_ , and laugh at his jokes, and watch his back during firefights, but there’s always this invisible wall keeping them at a distance, and Ghoul understands that he was the one to put it there, but he’d really like it gone now.

He’s not an idiot. He knows he’ll have to be the one to change things if they’re going to change at all. So that’s what he’s doing right now.

It’s just sitting. Easiest thing in the world. He still wipes his sweaty palms on an equally-sweaty shirt before he goes for it.

“Hey Poison,” he tries to sound casual as he slides into the booth next to the redhead, one arm snaking around their shoulders in a hopefully-casual move.

Poison freezes for a second before turning, and fuck, it’s—it’s like watching the desert sky flush a million colors at sunset, it’s like watching a cactus flower bloom during the rare flash flood. Poison melts against him, resting their head on his shoulder, hooking a hand in the pocket of his jacket, and he cannot fucking _believe_ that’s all there is to it, that he could’ve had this for the past year but was sabotaged by his own damn emotional constipation.

“Earth to Ghouuuulie…”

“Uh, yeah?”

Poison huffs in mock-affront.

“I _said_ , you here for any particular reason?”

“No. Nah, just. You know, this,” he gives a shrug with his free shoulder. “I can move?”

“Don’t you dare,” Poison winds an arm around his waist and shifts so that their head is resting on his chest rather than his shoulder.

They have to break apart when the radio crackles with news about another BLI sweep, but Ghoul spends the rest of the day feeling a warmth that has nothing to do with the desert.

* * *

_iii. Men kill for this, or for as much_

The thing is, Ghoul’s about ninety percent sure that he’s in love. He doesn’t have anything to compare it to, but he doesn’t know what else to call the ache in his chest at any contact with Poison, even through layers of cotton and leather.

Because yeah…that cuddle moment in the diner booth a few days back was apparently some sort of signal. Poison touches him all the time now, teasing hits to the arm and lingering hair ruffles and naps against his chest. And somehow it’s not enough. Ghoul doesn’t even know what he wants besides simply _more_.

He finds himself sticking closer to Poison in their next firefight, rather than taking the perimeter. It’s a good thing he does, because Poison and Kobra are back-to-back but the latter goes down from an unlucky short-circuit from his power glove, and Poison whirls around to catch him instinctively, shielding him with their body and managing to clip a drac as they stumble under the weight. It leaves their back turned to the drac _they_ were originally facing, and it’s such a careless move that Ghoul’s not actually sure who he’s mad at as he pumps that mask full of plasma. Poison’s made themselves a target now, crouching stubbornly over their brother even as Kobra stirs, and Ghoul can hardly breathe through the combination of rage and panic.

He tackles the next drac in range, grappling until he has a hold of its raygun and then sending a clean shot through the thing’s throat. He starts firing from both hands, clearing a path toward the Trans Am. Jet gets what he's doing immediately and backs him up.

“Poison, get him to cover!”

Once Kobra’s safely behind the car, Poison rejoins the fight, but they’re distracted, clearly trying to end this quickly. It makes them a little reckless, more willing to get into close quarters rather than relying on sharpshooting, which is how they end up with their face pressed into the gravel and a barrel against their temple. It’s only for a split second, because the next moment the drac goes limp, and Ghoul kicks the body out of the way before offering them a hand up.

“Thanks for the save. Both of em,” Poison squeezes his arm before letting go.

Ghoul becomes very aware of the way Poison is looking at him, bright like a match dropped into gasoline. And how close they are. And to be perfectly honest, this is probably the coolest he’s ever looked, fresh from two rounds of heroics.

“I think I love you,” he blurts, almost braining himself with the stolen raygun as he brings a hand up to scratch the back of his head nervously.

“Yeah? Well, let me know when you’re sure,” Poison's voice has gone soft, and they trace long artist’s fingers down his cheek. Ghoul surges up to kiss them, narrowly avoiding another collision with the raygun.

He could say it’s like fireworks, or a shot of moonshine, or burying himself in guitar strings, or landing a perfect flip at the crash track, but in truth it’s like nothing he’s ever known.

“Seriously?” Jet yells from where he’s exchanging fire with the last two dracs. Ghoul cracks an eye open long enough to shoot one, which shuts him up.

They only break apart once a car horn blares through the desert.

"Hands where I can see them, Fun Ghoul," comes Kobra's deadpan.

Grinning, Poison links their fingers together, and they walk hand in hand toward their crew.

**Author's Note:**

> Anyone else been listening to Danger Days on loop during the multiple ongoing global crises?


End file.
